Category Archives: 9184

The System Center Online team has been working hard in preparation for its next beta release of System Center Online Desktop Manager, expected in the fall of this year. This exclusive beta will only be available to a select number of customers. Our last beta was only offered to a small audience and resulted in a lot of great feedback from the customers who participated. This time we are widening the scope to include a few hundred customers. Here's what will be included in the upcoming release:

Updates Management Workload: Manage the Microsoft updates from a web-based console. Review available updates, choose updates and deploy to selected computers or groups of computers. Imagine WSUS from the cloud.

Policy Workload: Provides the ability to configure operational settings of the Windows Update and Anti-Malware agents installed on the client computers.

Alerts Workload: Helps you quickly and easily find problems (or potential) on your computers. You can also get help on how to solve the problem or how to start troubleshooting.

More workloads will be offered in later beta releases, expected in Spring 2010. More information on the full SCODM service can be found in my previous blog post.

We are looking for customers who are interested in participating in the fall beta! If you are an IT Pro who manages an IT environment and are interested in participation, we'd like to hear from you. Here's what we are looking for in our beta participants:

Active involvement in discussion groups, good feedback and bug reporting

Ability to deploy to a number of test PCs (preferably 5 or more)

Test on a variety of browsers, Windows operating systems, and PC architectures.

Ability to run through all the documented core scenarios and provide feedback

If you can commit to these requirements, please visit our Connect site and complete the nomination questionnaire (you may need to register on Connect before accessing the questionnaire). In October, we will be reviewing all applicants and selecting the most suitable candidates. Selected participants will be notified by email by the end of October.

Two System Center Server Management Suite licensing changes will become effective 1 July, 2009, with the release of Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 R2*:

· System Center Server Management Suite Enterprise <SMSE>will be switched from an unlimited operating system environment to a four operating system environment, limited license with a corresponding 20 per cent price decrease.

· A new suite offering, Microsoft System Center Server Management Suite Datacenter <SMSD> will be introduced and will include the same products as System Center Server Management Suite Enterprise, but, it will be licensed per processor and will provide for the management of an unlimited number of operating system environments.